


You Have The Right To Remain...Stupid

by aesterismo



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:09:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aesterismo/pseuds/aesterismo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The “truth” was that almost everyone except for the two idiots involved knew it was inevitable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Have The Right To Remain...Stupid

**Author's Note:**

> #alternatively titled "the misadventures of two dumbasses in love"  
> #aka reasons why kagami now listens to his shadow's advice /always/

“You want me to _what_?”

A few of the kids picked their heads up from their coloring, turning to the corner table – the source of the noise – where Kagami was sitting with Kuroko.  Kagami dropped his arm, lowered his head, and made a noise like an elephant with its trunk burrowed in a water hole.  Kuroko, taking pity on him, put down his red pen and stopped grading papers to repeat what he said just before.

“I said,” sighed Kuroko, using his best please-tell-me-you-aren’t-pulling-my-leg voice, “you need to be direct if you want any results.  Especially if it’s Aomine-kun.”

“C-Could you just— not—!”  Kagami hissed like a sputtering faucet, nearly throwing himself over the students’ paintings and number worksheets to cover Kuroko’s mouth.  His face was more than a bit pink, Kuroko noted, so flustered that the off-duty fireman didn’t feel the start of a smile against his palm.  “If you say his name loud enough, the kids’ll hear!”

“You weren’t exactly whispering either, Kagami-kun.”

He certainly lived up to his name, the schoolteacher mused, going back to his grading only after he watched Kagami twitch, grumble and grouse under his breath (something about _snot-nosed brats_ and _wish he didn’t know me_ _so damn well_ ), and slump back in the plastic seat across from his former basketball partner.  A mirror of a beast, to be sure, but hardly the wild animal his name and appearance would lead strangers to believe. 

Maybe it was better the countless families and had no idea how shy this harsh-looking hero of the town was.

“Hey, Kuroko.”  Never one to back down from a fight, Kagami craned his head just enough for Kuroko to see his discomfited expression out of the corner of his vision as he spoke in the quietest tone he could manage.  “Don’t laugh at me for asking this, but…do you think…y’know…you think I’m crazy?”

“Context, Kagami-kun.”  Kuroko couldn’t hold back a small but affectionate laugh this time.  “Otherwise, I might just have to say ‘yes’ to that question.”

Kagami reached out to ruffle the smaller man’s hair, smirking in spite of himself.  “Okay, okay, fine…then do you think I’m crazy stupid for not…noticing it before?”

Kuroko blinked.  “And by ‘it,’ you mean…”

“Goddammit, Kuroko—!!”

“Mind your language if we’re around the children, Kagami-kun—”

“Fine— okay— d-do you think I’m stupid for…liking…a guy like him…?”

Kuroko beamed.  “That’s more like it.  Now, if you say that just a touch louder with a little more enthusiasm, you’ll be able to say it directly to Aomine-kun for sure.”

“Rghhnnngh, YOU…!” 

“Just be honest,” chimed Kuroko in his yes-I-do-know-you-best-so-listen-carefully voice, “and be as direct as you possibly can.  Aomine-kun was never one for subtlety, after all.”

Kagami supposed, after leaving behind the stares of twenty-something pairs of wondering eyes and the self-satisfied smile of one Kuroko Tetsuya, the advice his shadow gave him was good enough from one of the best inside sources he could think of.

* * *

 

Of course, the following week was spent reading a myriad of self-help books on public speaking and techniques to start. 

To _start_.

But he gave into his reservations and asked around some more.  You know.  Just to make sure he had several other opinions under his belt beforehand.

He called Coach Aida and got an earful from both her and Hyuuga-senpai (who hadn’t mellowed out in the least even after he and Coach were officially engaged). 

He dropped by Kise’s place one evening with every intention of leaving after ten (but, as always, Kise dragged him out for shopping and drinks and held him up a good two hours longer simply because he couldn’t stop prattling on about all of “Aominecchi’s” good and bad points). 

He went as far as Midorima’s clinic’s doorstep and turned away - and then regretted it, because he bumped into Murasakibara (who had been walking along with **Akashi** , of all people) on his way past the corner store at the corner of the same street. 

He called Tatsuya after that, hoping to gain back some sanity – or at least some semblance of it – and craving a bit of familiarity after talking with so many other old friends and teammates and rivals and acquaintances.

All the advice he received was (nearly) the same as Kuroko’s: be honest and upfront about how you feel and he’ll surely reciprocate.

But Kagami was never good with situations involving emotions. 

He was the poster child for impulsiveness in almost everything – the type to act first and reflect later – but this was a different matter altogether.  This was more than just serious.  This was life or death!

Because he was pretty sure that if Aomine turned him down, he’d rather die than know his first crush that grew into outright infatuation ended in an outright rejection.

(Okay, so maybe that was a touch too dramatic even for him.  But still.)

Still.  What if’s should have been the last thing on his mind, since he hadn’t even started writing out his letter as a practice script, but _what if Aomine turned him down?_   It wasn’t even a heartbreak issue any more; he had put so much time and effort and energy into finding a way to be honest with himself, so the thought of it all being for naught was—

No.  He wouldn’t go down like this.  Not without a fight.

* * *

 

So he swallowed his pride.  Admitted it in front of the mirror.  Said it out loud – and _proud_.

He was always a little jealous of Aomine.

Jealous, at first, of what Kuroko’s former ‘light’ had.  Then, jealous of what he had that Kagami knew damn well he didn’t.  And then, he ended up jealous of everything – and everyone – who could be around the guy more often than he could. 

He always thought Aomine was ridiculously good-looking.

Everyone knew it, apparently, except for him.  Back in high school, he was still trying to work out who he was, let alone what he wanted out of life. 

But whereas that was the excuse then, his profession left him with a lot of free time. 

Granted, he had a lot of free time after dropping out of college, too – time to think of all the things he could have done, should have done, when he had the chance – but even that wasn’t what tipped him off to what his heart and his brain tried to tell him all this time.

When he saw Aomine for the first time in years, _years_ , by chance when the police officer stopped by the station to go over a few reports with the local building inspector, that was when it hit him.

When he struck up a conversation with Aomine – much to their surprise – that ended on a lighthearted and moderately civil note, that was when he realized it.

When Aomine stopped by again of his own accord the next week, and then the week after that, and at least once in the weeks to follow after that – “just to talk with Taiga,” he would explain to the station manager, even when everyone at the station began to notice the considerable lack of case files Aomine brought with him and the surplus of laughter coming from Kagami’s office – that should have been the neon-lit sign pointing out how attached they were already becoming.

He should have known.  He should have known better by the time the rainy Monday afternoon came that he mustered up the courage at last to pull Aomine around the back of the station and confess.

“So what you’re trying to say,” exhaled the still dazed Aomine after Kagami finally managed to get through his interminable speech, “is that you knew…from the beginning…”  When cobalt hues slammed shut and an exasperated wrinkle to his brow took hold, Kagami felt his heart constrict.  “Honestly, Taiga—”

“You know what.”  Kagami crumpled the paper tight in his balled fists, turning on his heel to head back inside.  “Just— forget I said anything, okay?  And you don’t have to feel like you have to keep coming by every other day just to check up on me.  I-I’ll be f—”

Aomine was always like a hurricane, the kind of uninhibited and unrelenting and unconventional that Kagami wished he could be.

But he moved quicker than any hurricane, any storm, any flashflood that Kagami had ever witnessed in his life when he tried to walk away in that moment.  Aomine didn’t just run to him; he _stormed_ forward, wrenching him by the thin fabric of his undershirt and sending him sprawling back into the brick-lined corner of the edifice, pinning him outright against the jagged blocks before bumping their foreheads none-too-gently against one another.

“ _Honestly_ , Taiga,” ground out an obviously frustrated Aomine, gloved hands lifting the frayed ends of Kagami’s shirt to caper across the persistent flutter in his abdomen and warm mouth pressed briefly to his damp forehead, “you’d have to be the biggest idiot in the world to think I didn’t want this from the start, either.  But Tetsu’s right:  you really do live up to your name, Bakagami.”

“L-Look who’s talking!” Kagami screeched – in part due to the dry mouth syndrome this whole situation had given him and in part because Aomine’s burning touches were drifting decidedly southward and it took all of his strength to keep those sneaking hands away from his belt.  “The least you could’ve done was done me the courtesy of giving me a clue you liked me back, Ahomine!”

“That’s Daiki to you,” chuckled the self-satisfied Aomine, leaning in to nip at the faintly pink shell of Kagami’s ear and eliciting a reluctant shudder from the redhead arching into his ministrations, “ **Taiga**.”

Then, surprising them both, Kagami grabbed Aomine by the collar of his uniform and switched their positions entirely by distracting the darker-skinned man with a searing kiss – and, after pulling away, left the stunned Aomine alone to gaze at the older man’s retreating back as he headed back inside without him.

“We’ll talk more after you’re done with your patrol for the night, then,” Kagami practically sang out, glad that Aomine was too shocked to follow him so he couldn’t see the amusement all too evident on his face, “ **Daiki**.”

When Aomine’s silence answered him, Kagami couldn’t have been more optimistic about the rest of the working week still ahead of him – of them – and started to make plans for where he could  take his boyfriend out to dinner tonight.


End file.
